Matt Brandyberry was born on October 10, 1984. The songwriter, rapper and multi instrumentalist founded From Ashes to New in Pennsylvania in 2013, finding a place for musical interests he had previously pursued separately.
“Through It All” became an early introduction to that approach, pairing his rap vocals with the band’s combination of heavy guitars and melodic singing. Included on the debut album Day One, released February 26, 2016, the song examined how relationships can change someone for better or worse. Brandyberry described its subject as extending beyond romance to friends and family, too.
His own path began with rap. Growing up in rural Pennsylvania, Brandyberry imagined becoming a rapper but encountered people who discouraged that ambition. He told Authority Magazine in 2018 that he responded by learning guitar and joining a local band. After years without the progress he wanted, he returned to rap, setting the foundation for From Ashes to New. Along the way, he worked as a cable television installer and fitted music around his job, writing and performing during evenings and weekends.
The project initially gave him somewhere to put those ideas without the expectations of a touring band. In a 2016 interview with The Rockpit, Brandyberry recalled that the musicians were recording songs before they had assembled a functioning live group. Satellite radio picked up their second recording, and the attention forced them to build a band around the music. They continued writing Day One without a contract and entered the studio under the same circumstances. A deal followed when the album was almost finished.
That sequence gave Brandyberry a practical reason to trust the material, but maintaining the band required another kind of work. After the debut, lineup changes left him rebuilding the vocal partnership at the center of the songs. He found Danny Case through an audition video Case had uploaded for an unrelated opportunity and contacted him on Facebook. Case told Live Metal in 2018 that Brandyberry asked him to audition with From Ashes to New material before the band widened its search. Case joined in 2017.
The resulting album, The Future, arrived in 2018 with Case and drummer Mat Madiro in the lineup. Its writing process involved contributions across instrumental roles. Case described the members exchanging ideas for guitars, melodies and lyrics, with Madiro directing the drum parts. He also noted that Brandyberry had written substantial drum material on earlier records. The founder’s contribution extended beyond the voice listeners heard in the verses.
Brandyberry’s willingness to reconsider the music became central to Reflections, released April 17, 2026. Following Blackout, the band completed demos for 16 songs in late 2023, then decided that most of the material was not working. In an April 2026 interview with New Noise Magazine, Brandyberry described becoming so occupied with expectations for the next album that the writing suffered. “We kept two songs and started over,” he said.
Rebuilding the record allowed the musicians to judge individual songs without constantly measuring them against their previous work. Brandyberry also expanded his vocal contribution, singing on “Die For You.” Another track, “Forever,” emerged near the end of the sessions. In the album’s release announcement, he described deliberately leaving that song’s feelings of regret unresolved, allowing its ending to retain the discomfort that had shaped the writing.
